There were more manufacturing closures in the UK this week in the electronics industry with the decision by Atmel to sell its fab in North Tyneside. It has cast a further shadow over the Freescale fab in East Kilbride.
Accordingly the Unite trade union have warned that the news from Atmel is a concern. The private equity owners at Freescale have said they are looking for a buyer for the facility, a closure is expected if no buyer is found.
We know there is a long-standing trend of manufacturing migration to cheaper areas of the world, where labour costs are a quarter and more of that in the UK. Just the other week 500 job cuts were announced as the result of the closure of Cadbury’s factory in Keynsham.
Of course, the semiconductor industry is going through some big changes which have nothing to do with chocolate manufacture, but the general point about manufacturing migration appears to cover all sectors from Dyson’s vacuum cleaners to Raleigh’s bicycles, not to mention the massacre in the PCB (printed circuit board) industry.
But what has occurred to me is that somewhere out there is a belief that goods manufactured in the UK are of the very best quality. So, surely someone can work out a way of making use of this reputation? Of course my idea is flakey and half-baked but I would love to see a start-up called the British Manufacturing Company come into being with the very best techniques and management, producing the very best quality goods anywhere in the world.
And if the Government can hand out money in the form of grants to back the Atmel fab (previously owned by Siemens), could they not back the British Manufacturing Company too? Perhaps there are too many EU trade laws that forbid such a possibility.